Ballenberg Museum

Erin has been working as a summer hire in the Community Liaison Office at the Embassy (planning activities for the Embassy spouse community).  So she has been researching lots of activities and events in Switzerland and has developed her own bucket list for her last month here.  So...off we went to the Ballenberg Museum near Brienz (past Interlaken) for the day.  We also have guests visiting so they joined us, too.

Nate and Erin in front of a water wheel used for grinding flour.

The Ballenberg Museum is an outdoor museum with a stroll through the past.  It has more than 100 century-old buildings from all over Switzerland, grouped according to the area they come from.  There are 250 farmyard animals, traditional, old-time gardens and fields, demonstrations of local crafts including cheese making, bread making, wood carving, lace making, pharmaceuticals with garden, etc. 

Erin observing a period style bedroom (the kitchen is behind her).   Notice the smoke detector on the ceiling. 

Nate watching the cheese making.

We bought some cheese and then Nate wanted to feed some of it to the chickens.  I said it wouldn't be good for the chickens diet because I did not want to waste our cheese on them.  Then 2 seconds later we turned around and the woman we had just bought our cheese from was feeding the chickens cheese scraps (what do I know?)  She shared the scraps with the kids so they could all have the joy of chickens chasing after them.

Feeding the roosters.

Head butting goats.

Lori and Erin

A couple happy, ringing cows.

The cows wear cow bells all the time so the farmers know where they are (or because the tourists expect it).  The large cow bells by Erin are ones that the cows wear when they are returning from a summer in the alps.  They make a large parade and all the village cows and families return at the same time.  Hopefully we can attend one of these celebrations this fall :)

Erin by some rather large cow bells.

Erin, Nate and our friends waiting for Dan and I to bring lunch.

Dan and Nate dressed for a day out in the town.

Nathan practicing with crutches.

Nate and Charles playing in their 10th trough of the day.

Erin and Lori in Ticino

Ticino is in the southern most part of Switzerland on the border of Italy.  It looks the most different from the other village styles.  They actually bring the real buildings from the various areas of Switzerland.  This villa was huge and from the late 1800's.  It had originally been the housing quarters for a large estate of workers.  The owner did not live there but all the workers and their families did.  In the 1930's 4 families bought the place and lived there with their families to farm the grounds.  Then a family of 6 bought the place.  When a highway was going to go through the villa they decided to bring it to the Ballenberg Museum.